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8-15: Xiaomi is looking to set up 2 more manufacturing facilities in India through Foxconn; Global shipments of mobile devices with the iris and facial recognition features will reach 400mln units; etc.

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According to Gartner, ending 3 consecutive years of double-digit growth, foundries’ revenue will increase by just 4%-6% in future years. Foundries gear up value-added services for fan-out and wafer-level packaging business. (Gartner report)

The foundry growth of advanced technologies will continue. According to Gartner, 28nm, 16nm and 10/7nm are 3 popular nodes for foundry business. 10nm is considered as a transitional half-node to the 7nm node. (Gartner report)

Touch Display

MIT has developed a method to turn glasses from transparent to opaque. Their technique uses electrochromic materials that can instantly change the color of glass from transparent to nearly black by applying a bit of electricity. (TechCrunch, Engadget, MIT)

Memory

According to Gartner, oversupply of DRAM in 2016 will be due to weak end markets, and to Samsung and SK Hynix’s new capacity. Gartner assumes China will enter the DRAM market in 2018/2019, with at least one new fab will result. China’s entrance will create oversupply in 2019 causing Samsung’s aggressive response. (Gartner report)

Samsung debuts its new Z-NAND. On the surface the new 1 TB Z-SSD, which is built with Z-NAND, is very similar to other existing PCIe SSDs. Samsung claims that this new specialized version of NAND provides a radical performance increase compared to existing NAND-based SSDs. (EE Times, My Drivers, Hexun, Tom’s Hardware)

Battery

Huawei has applied for a trademark for “SuperCharge” in the European Union—a demo is shown that a 3000mAh Li-ion battery was charged to nearly 50% in 5 minutes and a 600mAh battery charged to 68% in 2 minutes. (Ubergizmo, Digital Trends, TMDN, GYWB)

Biometrics

According to TrendForce, iris and facial recognition features will gradually become prevalent in mobile devices. It estimates that in 2020, global shipments of mobile devices with the iris and facial recognition features will reach 400 million units. By that time, the market value of infrared LEDs (IR LEDs) for iris and facial recognition will total around USD250 million. (TrendForce, press, TrendForce[cn], press)

Xiaomi is looking to set up 2 more manufacturing facilities in India through its Taiwanese contract manufacturer Foxconn Technology Group. According to Manu Jain, India chief of Xiaomi, the company was in talks with various state governments for finalising the land and other issues for the plants. (CN Beta, Domain-B, BGR)

According to sustainability report of Huawei for 2015, till end of 2015, Huawei employee number is about 170,000, 45% of which belongs to R&D. (199IT, Huawei report, 163)

According to DeviceAtlas, a report based on web traffic reveals that 2Q15-2Q16, Apple lost web traffic share in 18 out of 20 countries. U.S. web traffic share dropped 4%, and in Germany the decline was 6%. Apple’s slice of the web traffic pie in the U.K. declined by 10%. Samsung’s share of web traffic grew in 18 out of 20 countries in the 4 quarters that ended with 2Q16. (Phone Arena, DeviceAtlas report, CNBC, CNFOL)

The Future Laboratory, a consultancy that tries to predict trends in 14 industry sectors, has teamed up with Microsoft Surface, to look at the jobs which today’s students will be undertaking by 2025, ranging from Spacejunk Archaeologists, Memory Storage Specialists, Battery Innovators, and even Human Parts Designer. (CN Beta, Microsoft, USA Today, WinBeta)

Blocks Smartwatch is the modular smartwatch is built on a completely open platform – the Core Package includes the Core Module along with a strap –1.39” AMOLED display, Qualcomm Snapdragon 2100 processor, 512MB RAM, 4GB flash memory, and based on Android 6.0. Add-on modules is USD35 a piece. (Digital Trends, Engadget[cn])

Internet of Things

As Nielsen indicates, young Americans are watching less and less TV. Since 1Q11, the time Americans aged 18-24 spend watching TV has dropped by almost 40%. In the most recent quarter, young Americans spent an average of 16 hours and 18 minutes a week watching traditional TV, down from 26 and a half hours 5 years ago. (Motley Fool, Statista, Nielsen, report)

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